Southport 1 v 0 Alfreton Town

Southport managed to get the monkey off their back, after finally winning at home, with a slender 1-0 victory against a tough Alfreton team, who were denied on several chances by Steve Drench.

Although Alfreton started sharply, Southport had the first best chance to take the lead as Chris Holland surged forward, getting the ball across to Tony Gray, whose speculative shot from the edge of the area was well pushed away around the post by Laurence Matthewson.

Alfreton themselves had a glorious chance to open the scoring as Matthew Glass beat the off-side trap, and having got beyond Drench, only to be thwarted by the back-tracking Paul Barratt who saved his team blushes.

The game really opened into an end-to-end battle as Paul Clayton got the ball through to Glass, only for his shot to go straight to Drench, then down at the other end, Michael Rae turned just outside the area, with his shot just going over the bar. Moments later, Paul Barratt played a ball from the left wing into Tony Gray, only for his shot to go straight at Matthewson.

Alfreton stepped up a gear and started to put Southport under a great deal of pressure. The pressure appeared to over-whelm the defence as a mis-clearance from Paul Barratt gave Brian Cusworth a chance, but he was cut out at the last moment by Kevin Lee who cleared the ball for a corner. Moments later, Lee mis-read a ball which allowed Clayton to beat the offside trap, and with only Steve Drench to beat, the Southport keeper got a valuable hand on the ball, denying a clear goal scoeing chance. Cusworth fed another dangerous ball through to Glass moments later, only for his shot to go narrowly wide.

The game remained finely poised in the second half, with Southport creating the best of the early chances. Mark Duffy played a dangerous ball in from the right wing through to Tony Gray at the back post, but he was just unable to connect as the ball went screaming past him. Alftreton refused to play by the script continuing to apply pressure and creating chances constantly. They had another good chance when Matthew Glass played the ball through to Chris Wilson, whose on-target shot was pushed onto the post by Drench, with the ball being cleared away by the defence.

Southport took the lead on 74 minutes as Neil Prince served the ball out to Michael Rae out on the left channel who fired the ball low from the edge of the box which flew beyond the well-beaten Matthewson.

Despite over four minutes of stoppage time, Southport held firm, collecting the valuable three points, which were vital considering other results, which puts them right back into the battle for Blue Square North Play-off positions.